It may seem hard to believe now, but success was anything but guaranteed when Joe Finley and Craig Stein bought a baseball team and moved it to Allentown, Pa. For even though the veteran minor league operators were building a new downtown ballpark that they promised would rank among the best in the minors, the Lehigh Valley area was hardly uncharted territory, and locals skeptical about supporting another team could simply point to the memory of a half-built stadium on the outskirts of town as a reminder of past failures.

The Freitas Awards are Baseball America's annual awards honoring the best operators in Minor League Baseball. They are named after Bob Freitas, a longtime ambassador of minor league baseball who helped operators around the country. The following are the 2011 Freitas Award winners.

Although a minor league game is played in MerchantsAuto.com Stadium 71 times a year, the New Hampshire Fisher Cats front-office staff doesn't really consider the venue a ballpark. It's a community center to them, which explains their year-round success.

If a minor league owner could create a blueprint for success, it would probably look something like this: win games, boost attendance, become more profitable and remain an integral part of the community. The San Jose Giants have done all those things and more, making them an easy selection for Baseball America's 2009 high Class A Freitas Award.

If the admiration of your peers is the highest complement, then the Tri-City ValleyCats have plenty of reasons to be proud. For over the past few years, the club that moved from Massachusetts to New York seven years ago has become the toast of the New York-Penn League.

Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of the Iowa Cubs' 2009 season is what the team had to endure in 2008. The I-Cubs' return to normalcy after one of the worst natural disasters to hit the region was no small feat—neither was the 10.2 percent increase the Triple-A Pacific Coast League affiliate saw at the gate in 2009.

The best is still ahead for one of minor league baseball's most accomplished franchises. The venerable Columbus Clippers will be moving to new Huntington Park in 2009 and will begin a new affiliation with the Indians.

In today's age, the minor league teams drawing the most fans are typically those with the newest ballparks. That's not the case with the Birmingham Barons. Sure, Regions Park is newer than the stadium they left, but that can be said of every ballpark in America. After all, Rickwood Field is the oldest standing ballpark in the country.

It's a tried and true recipe for success: Take a town hungry for baseball, give it a consistent winner in a beautiful, new ballpark and then sit back and watch the turnstiles spin. The Greeneville Astros have followed the plan to a tee in their five seasons in the Rookie-level Appalachian League, consistently providing a high-quality product while annually leading the league in attendance, two key reasons why they are the 2008 short-season winners of the Freitas Award.

In their five seasons in the Rookie-level Appalachian League, the Greeneville Astros have consistently provided a high-quality product while annually leading the league in attendance, two key reasons why they are the 2008 short-season winners of the Freitas Award.

Stable and committed are two adjectives that aptly describe the Missoula Osprey franchise in the Pioneer League and its ownership, the Ellis family. But they're more than just words, they're qualities that have been put to the test since the franchise came to Montana eight years ago.

The Frisco RoughRiders debuted in suburban Dallas-Fort Worth in 2003, and they've dominated the attendance standings not only in the Texas League but in all of Double-A from the first time the gates opened.